


Come Hell or High Water

by caimani



Category: Bandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Domestic, M/M, Possession, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-23
Updated: 2015-11-23
Packaged: 2018-05-03 00:26:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5269616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caimani/pseuds/caimani
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gerard and Patrick are witches. They're a bit disorganized and absentminded at times; nevertheless, they're skilled at their craft. And they're very normal, friendly residents, so the last postman can fuck off.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Come Hell or High Water

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [lamebxy's](http://lamebxy.tumblr.com/post/130724202350/but-like-imagine-witchy-geetrick) art.

The problem with constantly starting a dozen new projects each day to make balms, potions, candles, and herbal blends was that sooner or later, Gerard and Patrick ran out of containers. In the midst of mixing and stirring and cooking a room full of bowls and pots, neither of them gave much thought as to where they would put the products once they were complete.

That usually led to one of them running around the house looking for any empty jar or box that they could find. Sometimes they ended up pouring the sugar or flour onto the table and sometimes they had to make do with something far less conventional, such as the tall green mug that Ray sent as a Yule gift that was used for making a devotional candle, and the spray bottle originally meant for watering the hanging plants being filled with a potion to ward off ghosts. 

At least they usually remembered to label these things afterwards. Gerard had to make several reminder signs around their workroom to label everything after the day they invited Joe over and he ended up washing his hands with one of Patrick’s experimental creams that was _not_ intended to be used as soap. It made Joe’s hands glow a soft pink color for about half a day. Gerard still wasn’t sure when Patrick had made that stuff.

Today, Patrick was out of the house buying more appropriate glass jars and vials at an art supply store while Gerard had volunteered to ‘clean’ the house. That meant that he was attempting to locate more of the misplaced magickal items that had been scattered around the house and often innocuously buried in piles of mundane household items. While most of these items had labels scrawled onto them in sharpie or pencil, a few were still unlabeled, which led to Gerard sniffing and poking hesitantly at everything that could have possibly been used for their craft. 

As the hours passed by, Gerard started collecting the things that may or may not have been magickal on the kitchen table, including: a tea tin of leaves that didn’t quite smell like tea, a chapstick tube full of a bitter white cream with a frowny face and a red X over it drawn onto the cap, a plastic water bottle that held either very pure water or a very mild cleansing potion, several spare rosaries of tiny carved wooden beads, and a small box covered in duct tape, glitter, and protective sigils drawn in Patrick’s messy handwriting.

Gerard was just about to start checking the contents of one of the cupboards when there was a loud commotion of chiming, clattering, and someone crying out in alarm outside the door. Gerard left the cupboard open and hurried over to open the door. 

A very tall young man in a postal worker’s uniform had walked right into the intricate network of bells, wind chimes, crystals, and shells bound with wires that Patrick had spent days winding from post to post. Gerard winced at the small section that had been tugged out of place. One cluster of crystals arranged with steel wire into a frame shaped like a spider web had somehow fallen to the ground.

“I’m so sorry,” the postal worker stuttered. “I’m new and I wasn’t looking at your, uh, decorations. Gosh, I’m so, so sorry. If I broke anything--”

“It’s okay,” Gerard assured him, although he had no idea of the properties of the clusters of crystals that had been knocked to the ground. For all he knew, the poor postman had just been blessed with twelve years of good fortune. Or maybe he was now sterile, although Gerard was fairly sure that Patrick hadn’t worked with curses since junior year of high school.

“I, geez, I’m really sorry about this,” the postman continued, clearly flustered. 

“It’s a simple fix,” Gerard said. He hoped it was. Patrick should be home soon, and he could assess how simple a fix it really was. “Any mail for us?” Gerard asked, offering the postman a chance to stop crying over the damage.

“Uh,” the postman read the number on the door and bent his head down to rifle through his bag. “This is 6262 and… yes.” He dug out a handful of envelopes, double-checked the address on them, and handed them over to Gerard with a shaky smile. “Sorry about the, um, chimes, I think. I’ll be more careful from now on, I promise!”

Gerard nodded. “Have a blessed day!” he said cheerily. 

The postman apparently hadn’t noticed all of the various Catholic and pagan lawn ornaments on his way to Gerard and Patrick’s door, because his face just scrunched up in confusion as he left.

Gerard shrugged. At least the guy had some proof that Gerard was a normal, friendly person before he made the outlandish assumptions that the last postman had made. Really, some of the accusations the last one made were insulting and hurtful. And after Patrick and Gerard had been nothing but nice to that man!

When Gerard re-entered the house, he frowned. Something… something very close to him… felt wrong. He was normally pretty terrible at sensing spiritual things, so this presence must have been really strong. As he considered this, Gerard felt something start to squeeze and pinch roughly at the skin near the rosary wrapped around his right wrist. 

At that moment, there was a loud thudding sound coming from the stairs. Gerard looked up to see Lola sliding their huge pink body in coils down each step. He rushed up the steps to catch them before they ended up hurting themself.

“What’s wrong?” he asked his familiar. 

_Dangerous bad_ , his familiar answered. The massive snake wriggled uncomfortably in Gerard’s arms until he let them down onto the floor again. Lola sped across the smooth wooden floor to the workroom, followed closely by Gerard. He watched curiously as Lola bumped their head against a mason jar packed tightly with pale gray ash. 

Gerard bent down and opened the jar for Lola and the snake wasted no time in burying their face in the ash. “Whoa, careful, that stuff can hurt your eyes!” Gerard exclaimed, but Lola was already withdrawing their head and lunging up to dangle their body around Gerard’s neck. They settled their large body into a shape that Gerard vaguely recognized from one of the books Patrick kept looking over while making… something. He really needed to pay better attention to Patrick’s craft, even when Patrick would insist that he didn’t need any help.

Slowly, Gerard stood up from the ground. Lola didn’t budge. He could still feel the ‘dangerous bad’ presence, but it wasn’t touching him anymore. Rather, it felt like it was hovering over him, like a hot and humid raincloud. 

“What’s in the house?” Gerard asked. Lola remained still and silent. Gerard threw his hands in the air. “What do you want me to do?” If his familiar was scared but couldn’t--or wouldn’t--tell him about what exactly was going on, then how was he supposed to deal with--

Oh, but there was still that mirror.

With his familiar clinging snugly to his upper body, Gerard walked back into the living room, where they kept the cool creepy gem-studded mirror that took the two witches _weeks_ to purify. It had been useful several months ago when Patrick had his hands full with removing all the ghosts Gerard had (mostly) unintentionally invited onto his cell phone.

Gerard looked hopefully at the space behind him in the mirror, but it only revealed a yellow-tinted mass of black dust floating in the air. So this thing didn’t have any sort of corporeal form. Gerard narrowed his eyes. 

“You’re not welcome here. Please leave.”

In response, the dust cloud seemed to grow slightly larger. It flared bright yellow, then faded to black. The air in the living room thickened with each passing second. A slight humming sound started to ring throughout the room and gave Gerard an instant headache. Gerard felt Lola close their mouth around his left arm, which had somehow started to reach for the rosary. Gerard swallowed with some difficulty. 

“If you’re trying to hurt me, or this house,” Gerard said slowly, his voice sounding very far away, “Then you’re going to face some dire consequences.”

The air suddenly stopped humming, though it was no less thick and hot. In the mirror, the black dust cloud turned a sickly shade of yellow and shot towards the front door. 

Too late, Gerard heard footsteps on the porch. “Gerard?” Patrick’s voice called. “What happened to my wards?”

Gerard opened his mouth to shout a warning, but his voice came out far too soft and slow. “Pa…trick…” His body was frozen in front of the mirror and all he could do was watch in horror as the yellow dust hovered in waiting behind the door. The knob was turning. Gerard distantly felt Lola’s teeth scraping against his skin and his voice sounded a little louder this time when he tried, “Don’t… come…”

The door opened and Gerard wanted to scream as he watched the yellow dust engulf Patrick’s body. There was a sharp cracking noise and two pieces of glass fell to the floor. Gerard recognized the pieces from one of Patrick’s protective pendants. 

Peep Wentz shrieked and flapped his wings at the dust, but the small cloud easily batted the small bird away and poured rapidly into Patrick through his nose and mouth. Patrick fell backwards against the front door. Peep chirped loudly at Patrick, hopping around on the floor beside him.

The force holding Gerard in place was suddenly gone, and the lack of pressure caused Gerard to stumble to the ground. Lola slid off his body and slithered quickly over to Patrick, who was shaking and gasping for air, eyes tightly shut. Lola looped their body several times around Patrick, pinning his arms against his body. 

Gerard raced over to Patrick and sat securely on Patrick’s legs. A moment later, Patrick’s eyes snapped open. Their color was flickering between Patrick’s regular blue and the same sickly yellow as the dust. 

Lola rubbed their ash-coated head against Patrick’s neck. Patrick took a long, deep breath and gritted his teeth. 

“Chapstick. Did you find--” he managed to hiss before his eyes turned yellow again and his face became expressionless. Patrick tensed against Lola’s coils and Gerard’s weight pinning him down.

“Oh, this is the one I wanted,” the thing inside Patrick said, pleased. Gerard put his hands over Patrick’s shoulders and squeezed, not hard enough to hurt Patrick, but .

“Get out.” Gerard said, low and dark. “You picked the wrong place to break in. Get the fuck out.”

The thing twisted Patrick’s face into a smile. “How could I resist when he made a ward specifically designed to keep _me_ out? So interesting. I just want to know what he knows.” The smile faded after a moment. “Although, he’s being stingy with his knowledge right now. But not for long.”

Gerard narrowed his eyes. “Peep!” he shouted. Beside Gerard, Patrick’s familiar ignited his wingtips, bathing his small body in white fire. Gerard lifted his left hand off Patrick’s shoulder and Peep flew up to perch on it. Peep’s bright white flames spread along Patrick’s body, licking harmlessly at Lola and Gerard, until Patrick was completely covered in the flames. 

The thing inside Patrick howled and thrashed Patrick’s head from side to side and tried to chant something in broken phrases that didn’t sound like any human language Gerard had heard. 

Peep chirped sadly and laid his head against Patrick’s neck, continuously shedding the white fire. Meanwhile, Lola wrapped themself tighter around Patrick’s body and kept rubbing the remaining ash on Patrick. Gerard let go of Patrick’s other shoulder, watching for a brief moment to ensure that the two familiars wouldn’t be hurt by Patrick’s pained jerky movements. 

When Lola finally sent a wave of mental impatience at him, Gerard leapt off Patrick and raced over to the kitchen table. He grabbed the mystery chapstick he had found earlier and ran back to Patrick. Breathing heavily, he re-examined the scene in front of him and tried not to despair. It was like a freaky, messy exorcism-in-progress, but in the fucking _living room_. He tried to force the fear away and focus on fixing this as soon as possible.

“Peep, what is this?” Gerard shouted over Patrick’s screaming and inhuman cursing. 

The familiar leaned his head down to tap his beak on Lola’s scales. Peep’s weirdly low voice echoed through Gerard’s bond with Lola.

_Chapstick. Use it on him._

Gerard uncapped the chapstick and glanced at Patrick’s mouth, which was still spewing angry words in strange languages. He rubbed the bitter chapstick against his own lips and crouched down on the floor, straddling Patrick. He leaned his face forwards Patrick’s and prayed that Peep was right and that this would help.

Gerard caught the corner of Patrick’s mouth, which abruptly stilled. 

“You… what…” Patrick choked. He sounded like his throat had been rubbed nearly raw. “Mother…fucking--”

Gerard quickly smeared more of the chapstick against his lips and grabbed Patrick’s chin to keep it in place while whatever was still inside him screamed and tried to tilt his face away. Gerard pressed his lips firmly against Patrick’s mouth, smudging the chapstick against Patrick’s lips while trying to muffle the strangled shrieks. Gerard could still see the bright yellow of Patrick’s eyes, so he cocked his head to the side and kissed harder, almost to the point of bruising, teeth crashing against Patrick’s through their rapidly-swelling lips.

The yellow was starting to flicker again, but Gerard could still see it in his peripheral vision. He lifted his rosary-wrapped wrist and laid it gently against Patrick’s ash-covered throat. 

Patrick made a pained, choking sound and Gerard leaned away. Patrick shuddered and spat a tiny black ball out of his mouth, about the size of a marble. Peep’s white fire vanished and the bird jumped off Patrick’s shoulder to pluck the tiny ball off the ground before flying away to the workroom.

Gerard lifted Patrick’s chin so he could examine Patrick’s eyes. They were back to normal, although they were now lined with a trace of dark shadows. Relieved, Gerard leaned down to kiss him again, slower and with much less worry this time. Patrick’s lips caught each slow kiss and drew Gerard closer each time, inviting him deeper. Gerard’s tongue glided smoothly into Patrick’s mouth and he tasted some faint bitterness from the chapstick. He licked that away and savored the lush taste of Patrick that he knew and loved. 

Lola interrupted them. _I’m moving._

Gerard reluctantly moved away from Patrick to allow room for Lola to release Patrick and slither back upstairs. He and Patrick took that time to catch their breath and wait for some of the adrenaline that had been filling their veins to subside. 

“What… happened… to the wards?” Patrick asked in a hoarse voice. Gerard realized that Patrick was probably also exhausted after mentally fighting off… whatever that was.

Gerard smiled wryly. “New mail guy. He accidentally knocked a part of it down. What was that thing?”

Patrick groaned and tried to shakily push himself off the floor. Gerard stood up and helped Patrick to his feet, holding him steady until Patrick stopped swaying. 

“Jus’ a… bad spirit. I should… get rid’f it.” He coughed, making a rather painful sound. “Peep?” 

Gerard hesitated. He was glad that Patrick was better now, but he was still worried about the damage that spirit had done to Patrick. Obviously his throat was fucked up and he was exhausted. Patrick needed some warm tea and a long rest. And Gerard could put some of those new healing balms to use to relieve any pain Patrick was feeling.

Peep chirped loudly from the workroom and Patrick started walking, still shakier than Gerard thought was really safe. He started following after Patrick so that he could catch him if he lost his balance at any moment. They had almost reached the door to the workroom when Patrick turned back to face Gerard. “Thanks for… saving me,” he whispered. “Love you.”

Gerard felt his heart soar at those words. He caught up to Patrick and pulled him close against his body. “I love you too. I don’t know what I would do without you,” he said, brushing the edge of Patrick’s knit cap with several more light kisses.


End file.
